One person’s puck…

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe the saying goes “One man’s puck is another man’s junk.” At least, that was the case yesterday, when my girlfriend Shellie and I investigated a few boxes of discarded books in the alley. You usually don’t find anything good when people throw books away–just romance novels and The Da Vinci Code. I, on the other hand scored a hat trick and found two pucks and a hockey book amongst the otherwise mundane collection of travel guides and cook books.

One person’s junk…my pucks. Or treasures. Or however that saying goes.

Propped up atop one of the boxes, almost as if it wanted to be found, was a Chicago Blackhawks puck. I don’t normally collect pucks because the leagues and teams make so many different ones on purpose–collect ’em all, kids! But free is good. Heck, five bucks would be good. Hockey pucks sell for $8 to $15, depending on whether they are “game” pucks or “commemorative” pucks. This ‘Hawks puck is of the game category, but it is not game-used.

Digging around in a box of sex-advice books–the alley being a perfect place to find those, come to think of it–I also unearthed this Chicago Wolves puck. The puck is adorned with a Gaelic or Celtic-style font and shamrocks. Every year, the Wolves play a game or two in green St. Patrick’s day jerseys, and sell these shamrock-infested pucks. Some of the design seems worn off, particularly in the ring of green that is below the Wolves logo. The backside is also a bit scuffed up. Was it caught at a game? Who knows. I’m just glad I rescued it before some dumb kid used it to break a window.

Shellie found this book called The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Hockey. Because, apparently, only a complete idiot would want to watch hockey, right? Shellie asked me if I wanted this hockey book, which prompted me to pick up the discarded copy of Dogs for Dummies and ask her if she wanted that book.

Obviously, Shellie–a long-time dog lover and owner of three basset hounds–needs a guide to dogs as much as I need a guide to hockey. But paging through this Idiot’s book, it seemed to have quite a bit of semi-obscure factoids that I’ll find interesting.

By the way, the collection of books itself painted an interesting picture of the person who discarded them. Shellie surmised that the types of books–travel guides, health-conscious cookbooks and sex/relationship books–pretty much confirms that the previous owner was a woman. I mean, how many dudes do you know with “healthy eating” cookbooks? The owner of these books probably went to a Blackhawks game and a Wolves game this season, bought this Idiot’s book to better understand what the hell Brian Englbom is talking about, then broke up with her boyfriend, concluded that all men are stupid, that she was tired of cooking healthy meals, and that hockey was a waste of time.